Hello everyone!
I am here with another book review, The Art of French Kissing by Brianna R. Shrum. Thanks so much to NetGalley and SkyPony Publishing for providing me with an e-ARC of this book for an honest review, as always, all opinions are my own.
The story follows 17-year-old Carter, who has wanted to be a chef since she could work an oven. It is her dream, and when she gets accepted into a prestigious culinary scholarship program in Savannah, she is thrilled. When she arrives, however, she soon sees that her competition is fierce. Especially Reid, the guy who sabotages her first competition and soon becomes a thorn in her side. As the competition dwindles, Carter spends more time thinking about Reid - how to get revenge that is. But perhaps that rivalry is more than just some not-so-friendly competition.
Ok, I'm going to try to get through this review without gushing about this book and the romance, so bear with me. I think this was just the book I needed right now. I haven't read such a good book, especially a romance in such a long time. The whole book was really well done, but the romance was really spectacular in this one.
First of all, you give me a good enemies-to-lovers story and I'm basically hooked from the very beginning. And that's exactly what happened here. But not only that, the characters were great. Carter has a lot of self-doubts and anxiety about whether or not she belongs in this competition and I really connected with that. Reid was also a great love interest, he's snarky and funny and the chemistry between the two was great. They made a bunch of pop culture references which I loved (mostly because a lot of them were Star Wars related) and just really seemed to connect with each other.
We also see some great diversity in the book. Reid is part Japanese and identifies as bi/queer and one of Carter's friends is a lesbian. Most of the other competitors also come from a variety of racial and ethnic backgrounds as well, and one of the competitors is also a lesbian. There are a couple of instances where the characters talk about these things and they really help add to the story.
Overall, I don't know if other people will connect as well to the story and Carter as I did, but I would still highly recommend you give it a shot, if for nothing else, the amazing descriptions of food!